Help me break loose from Diatonic progressions

[ZeroS1gnol]

I was a bit in doubt whether this would belong in the beginners/faq forum, but the hell, I guess it's a pretty complicated matter of musical theory. Let me sketch the picture as simple as possible, I have a tendency to build my songs around a single scale, mostly the minor scale. So the song would consist of some riffing and a bit more chord oriented parts for the choruses. My older work would often find both starting with the key of a scale and progressions would be mostly diatonic. I have been trying to divert from starting chord progressions in the scale's key, but in a minor scale starting on a 5th or 6th sounds best, so I almost always revert to those notes as the root for a chord. Frankly, I'm getting a bit sick of always reverting to those patterns.

I try to divert by switching the key scale, which sometimes is nice, but still, it could be more interesting. I have experimented with just moving up to a different scale in a different key, to make it non-diatonic, but I often have trouble making things come together as a song.

Now here's where I need some advice: what are interesting and good sounding switches in key and scales while retaining that feeling of coherence between sections? Just to keep it a little bit simple, I would like to discover things around using minor/major scales. I don't really need to go in Jazz territory.

 

[gnoll]

I definitely recognize the feeling of reverting to the same old same old stuff. It's something I have wrestled with myself and not really come to any great conclusions about. Sometimes I beat myself up about using the same chord progression that I use very often. But then I listen to some music I like and, well hey, that band also uses that chord progression all the time. Maybe that's why I like the music.

I think for myself I can get a little bit too stuck on the chords when really, there's a lot of different things that can be done with a chord progression or a scale. A melody constructed from a diatonic scale can be many many different things even when just using those 7 notes. It can also be arranged and harmonized differently, and use different timbres and effects to produce a whole that sounds unique.

I'm having some trouble fully understanding your post though. From your explanation of what it is you're doing, I don't really understand... what it is you're doing... And what it is you're looking for. Can you explain closer? Maybe with some examples? Also "coherence" in music is pretty hard to define and nail down.

When working in a key, you can of course modulate to a different key. Depending on to where and how you do that it can give be more or less jarring, and have a different sort of effect. You can write stuff that's more modal and could give a certain type of flavor. You could use more spicy notes from outside the key and use borrowed chords from another key. You can use different, more exotic keys and scales.

Making things non-diatonic I don't really know how to answer other than don't use diatonic scales then? Again it's a little hard to know what kinda stuff you're after.

 

[ZeroS1gnol]

I realise that wat I am asking is vague... it really is. Maybe my question is a bit more concrete when I ask which types of modulations people apply to make a song not sound as if it's entirely in one key, but that it retains a feeling of fitting together (as subjective as that may sound).
I think my own tried and true method is switching from a E minor chord progression to a C# minor chord progression. C# minor is diatonic with a E major scale, so changes the mood, but still makes it easy to return to the E minor scale. I'm looking for similar examples.

 

[gnoll]

It's a pretty big question.

As far as modulations go... I mean, you could modulate anywhere. When you've established a tonality, the listener tends to be alright with that. But as far as doing that, if you modulate very far very suddenly it will be more jarring and more of a noticeable effect. That can work though, and it doesn't have to mean that the song won't sound coherent.

If you want a subtle modulation, the most closely related key is gonna be one 5th away in either direction, so e minor to b minor or to a minor. Moving to one of those scales only one note in the scale changes, as opposed to three if you go to c# minor.

If you want a different mood or feel, then maybe it can be more useful to think about where your tonal center is in the key rather than which key it is you're using. So it could be major or minor, but it could also be more of a modal flavor if you're hanging out on the lydian or phrygian or whichever chord. Or you could use other scales of course, like something based in harmonic minor, or something more chromatic, or something pentatonic, or a whole note scale, or really anything you want.

And then making the whole thing feel like it fits together, well, that's hard to say just like that. There's lots of things that can have an impact on that.

Sorry, not sure if I'm being helpful at all.

 

[SpaceDock]

I want to throw out a few simple ideas here. I know what’s like to be very comfortable rocking out in a minor or major chord progression that gets a bit boring....

Start in your traditional minor progression, then find a place to sit on the five chord. Then instead of returning to the minor i, use a quick flat major tonic and then land into the major tonic. This is used in a ton of songs. From there you can naturally sit in the major key of what was previously your minor key. Going back into the minor is super easy from there. I like the quick iiv root note before popping into the I because it really preps the ear.

start with you comfortable chord progression, but to add some more flavor use the dominant v chord from almost any chord in your progression to segue into a parallel key. I got this from youtuber Jake Lizzio. One of his videos was all about using dominant chords as a tool to exit and re enter keys due to the leading tone.

use a chromatic tone to add definition. This one is tricky and takes some practice, but the idea is that chromatic tones a few semitones lower than the tonic can sound exotic without being overly bizarre. I am talking about a sharp 5 or a sharp 6 to keep it simple. Adding a flat 2 or other notes just above the tonic get hard to hear your root/tonic. Anyways, use this one supplemental tone as a exaggeration. Normally work through your progression but add int this tone for a melodic emphasis to give some real character. I think about George Harrison when I do this style.

 

[ZeroS1gnol]

Sorry, not sure if I'm being helpful at all.

On the contrary, I really appreciate when people just speak their mind, try to theorize a bit.

Then instead of returning to the minor i, use a quick flat major tonic and then land into the major tonic. This is used in a ton of songs. From there you can naturally sit in the major key of what was previously your minor key. Going back into the minor is super easy from there. I like the quick iiv root note before popping into the I because it really preps the ear.

I'm trying to grasp what you are saying here. Are you saying that you when you sit on the five chord you're putting that in the major scale?

 

[SpaceDock]

For example if you are in G minor, you have a D minor v. Sit on that v, then try a quick F# then land on G maj. Both major and minor scales will have the same V/v if you drop the maj/min voicing, a dominant V will work here as well. The purpose of the quick vii F# is to push the ear towards your new Major. It doesn’t need to be a vii, it’s just pulling a tone from the Maj scale as a transition out of minor.

 

[PonStan]

The simplest tips I can think of is that you can use modes. Don't think of them as Jazz teritory. They have been there since the begining.

Dorian is the one that I would recomend, since you like minor. The 6th is raised, so you can use a major IV chord. It is rather refreshing.

Phrygian could be very epic or very dark.
The lowered 2nd can be bright, when used like the classical music uses the Neapolitan II (e.g. Db, G, Cm - IIN, V, I).
It is also evil-sounded when played like Pantera (e.g. power chords: F, E, Db, C)

You can use modal interchange to separate the sections. Start on Dorian, go to Aeolian, finish with Phrygia. Experiment.

 

[DudeManBrother]

You have to first know where you are (key,mode) then decide where you’d like to go. Know the notes that are common between the two, and the uncommon notes that make it distinct. Obviously the less commonalities the bigger the impact of the modulation. Utilize the common notes, where possible, in your transition to the new key.

You can also just borrow from parallel modes pretty easily; as long as it supports the melody.

 

[Kemono]

Learn songs.

Most good songs have weird things in them. If you find something weird in a song, ask about it. Learn what it is and use it in your own music.

Secondary dominants are good. If you're only using chords from a single scale, this is a good place to start.

ABBA uses a lot of secondary dominants.

Or check out "Still Lovin' You", Scorpions.

Intro:
G- | G-/F | Eb∆ | D7

Verse
G- | G- | A | D |

The verse has an A major chord. That's not in the key of G minor. But there is no modulation here, either. This is called a secondary dominant. It's the V of the V chord. D major is the V chord. The V of the V chord (D maj) is A maj (or A7).

The chorus of that song is AAB form with a 4 bar tag on the B section.

| G- | Eb | Bb | F |
| G- | Eb | Bb | F |
B: | G- | C- | D5 | G- |
Tag: | Eb | Eb | F | F |

Over the B section, Matthias Jabs plays a B note over the G- chord. He only does this the second time of the solo, closely following the motif he established the first time, but this time, playing B natural. That one brief note resolves up to C.

The next chord the band plays is Eb, not C-. It's a deceptive resolution led by the melody, as Matthias is tonicizing C- with this "wrong" note, and the band next plays Eb maj. This one "wrong" note has a poignant effect.

And that helps explain in part why they made millions of dollars.

 

[ZeroS1gnol]

Appreciating all the suggestions

 

[Kemono]

Appreciating all the suggestions

Please make a video of what you did applying these ideas and concepts.

 

[bostjan]

Radiohead - Creep

Simplest example of chord substitution.

Crazy Train - Ozzy

Relative major/minor tonal shift example.

For work on how to solo over relative keys, check out Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd.

Believe - Savatage

Has a bVII chord substitution, like a few early Led Zeppelin/The Who songs.

From there, listen to some Beatles or something. Pretty much all of their songs after their bubblegum era had cool chord substitutions in them.

Or, if you just want to look at a bunch of musical mayhem that looks like chaos, but makes perfect sense if you overanalyze it, listen to some later Death or anything with A Jarzombek brother writing it.

 

[Tracker_Buckmann]

2nd on learning the modes. If you want help understanding them i can explain them very easily.

Then watch this:

 

[Tracker_Buckmann]

And this:

 

[Solodini]

I think writing to follow a key is a recipe to be prescriptive rather than descriptive. Keys and scales describe typical note groupings but they don't mean you need to try to stick to that. If you want more interesting chord progressions then try to just focus on the chords, regardless of the key.

Like what SpaceDock said, you can use notes which are a semitone away from a note you intend to emphasise. Say you're in E minor, so you'd typically be using E minor (Chord I: EGB), A minor (chord iv: ACE), B minor (chord v: BDF#) or B Major (chord V: BD#F# so that the D# leads to E for resolution). The D major (DF#A) would typically be a diatonic chord, but you could use D min sometimes, to have the F lead to E or to F#, so D minor could lead to E minor, C major (or C# minor for extra spice), or A min or maj. The C# in A maj or C# minor could lead to D in B minor or to C in F major.

You can just start looking for ways that chords might link like this. And that's only exploring triads. You can hugely expand this when you start factoring in 7ths, 9ths, altered chords, suspensions and so on.

Another thing to pay attention to in doing this is to try to look out for, and create patterns which you can replicate and allude to in the melodic movement of your chord sequences. Let's take B minor, A maj, F#min, E min. There can be a line in there of D C#F#B which is descending a semitone, ascending a 4th, descending a 5th. You could use that same pattern to guide writing another sequence. Let's say we want to resolve to E minor again, but we'll make G the note that the melody lands on. We'll be descending a 5th to that, so the chord before would have D in it so let's go for D minor. We would have ascended a 4th to that from A, so let's use F major. We would have descended a semitone to the A from Bb so let's make use G minor. Gmin, F maj, D min, E min. Bb A D G follows the same intervallic pattern as DC#F#B so will have some familiarity to the ear.

I hope this helps some.

 

[Nag]

OP : search Paul Davids on YouTube and once you're on his channel, he's got a bunch of videos labeled "fix your boring chord progressions". They might even be arranged into a playlist. He goes in detail about slash chords, secondary dominants, tritone substitutions, chord extensions... it's good stuff.

 

[bigswifty]

For what it's worth, a friend and I made a modal interchange chord chart a year ago to use for this kind of thing.

https://modal-interchange-chart.com/

It has a little write up you can read on the site to help you out. But basically, find the key you're in and the chords you're using. Then you can swap chords out or add chords into the progression using chords from parallel modes.

For example, you said you write a lot in Minor. Let's just say you have a chord progression in C minor that goes i - iv - v - bIV - i.
You'd find Aeolian on the chart (which is Minor) and see that your chords are Cm - Fm - Gm - Ab - Cm.
Maybe you decide to swap the minor v chord for the Major V chord of the parallel major scale. You might also decide to add in the iv from the parallel major before the bV in your progression. Now you have this:

Cm - Fm - G - Am - Ab - Cm

Now I just totally made all this up off the top of my head using the chart. Try a bunch yourself! I love the flavours modal interchange adds to chord progressions. And you'll notice as a result your melodies will have to twist through some new scale territory to outline the chords more musically.

Good luck!

 

[Dushan S]

I was a bit in doubt whether this would belong in the beginners/faq forum, but the hell, I guess it's a pretty complicated matter of musical theory. Let me sketch the picture as simple as possible, I have a tendency to build my songs around a single scale, mostly the minor scale. So the song would consist of some riffing and a bit more chord oriented parts for the choruses. My older work would often find both starting with the key of a scale and progressions would be mostly diatonic. I have been trying to divert from starting chord progressions in the scale's key, but in a minor scale starting on a 5th or 6th sounds best, so I almost always revert to those notes as the root for a chord. Frankly, I'm getting a bit sick of always reverting to those patterns.

I try to divert by switching the key scale, which sometimes is nice, but still, it could be more interesting. I have experimented with just moving up to a different scale in a different key, to make it non-diatonic, but I often have trouble making things come together as a song.

Now here's where I need some advice: what are interesting and good sounding switches in key and scales while retaining that feeling of coherence between sections? Just to keep it a little bit simple, I would like to discover things around using minor/major scales. I don't really need to go in Jazz territory.

I actually do think that you may need to go into Jazz territory, unfortunately. But you should know it's not like there is some kind of clear border and when you cross it, it's all diminished and melodic minor scales and 13th chords. And you don't even have to listen to jazz if you don't want to. It would be just helpful for you to learn more how you can play with harmony. In my case I liked a lot 80's stuff, Peter Gabriel, Sting etc, and a lot of those albums were pop spiced up with some jazz and harmony experimentation. You could learn some more adventurous progressions from that time and recycle them in metal way. Also, try to learn about chord substitution and modes. For instance if you have progression using Em D C (VI - V - IV). You could replace C with Am7. Or you can use Fmaj7 instead of Am because Fmaj7 contains all the notes of Am. And if it sounds to "sweet" just use F power chord, and you will hear that used often. A lot of unusual chords may work in some cases. Try to compose melody over standard progression so that is completely diatonic, and than make a new progression instead of the old one by paying attention what notes you play at what time and try chords that are "off" but contain note(s) you are playing in that moment. Switching modes can also make things interesting. At least in metal, it is not unusual to have E major, E minor, E Phyrigian, E dorian and than E major again in chorus. (E - C - A - F progression for instance). Every bit of music theory you learn will help and open new doors, and learning pop rock songs from 70's and 80's when pop music was often really rich with chord changes can be quite useful.

 

[Drew]

I try to divert by switching the key scale, which sometimes is nice, but still, it could be more interesting. I have experimented with just moving up to a different scale in a different key, to make it non-diatonic, but I often have trouble making things come together as a song.

Now here's where I need some advice: what are interesting and good sounding switches in key and scales while retaining that feeling of coherence between sections? Just to keep it a little bit simple, I would like to discover things around using minor/major scales. I don't really need to go in Jazz territory.

Some great responses here already.

If there was one thing I could go back and change about how I learned music theory, it would be the early focus I had on starting from a scale and harmonizing it into chords, and then looking at those chords as a group of chords that worked well together to write with. That's all technically true... but, I think it caused me to downplay something that's as useful if not more so, cadence and resolution, the how and why of why it "sounds good" to go from one chord to another.

Like, the V-I resolution, or more specifically the V7-I, sounds fucking awesome and has this big, final-sounding closure to it. The reason for that ISN'T that they're both chords you can harmonize from the diatonic major scale. The reason is the notes within those chords - in E, the default key for all guitarists, that;s B7 to E major, or B-Eb(D# if you're being technical)-F#-A going to E-G#-B. It sounds big because, while you're holding the B steady, you have two half-step moves working crosswise with each other, a A that descends one pitch to a G#, coupled with a D# that ascends one pitch to an E. The V-I is a pretty big move when you look at it from root to root, but if you look at what's going on inside the chord, it's actually just a couple of really small moves, a half step shift in either direction, and one pitch constant.

Meanwhile, the IV-V movement sounds fine, nothing clashes... but it also feels pretty unresolved. Everything's moving a full step, between the two, so it doesn't have quite the same impact. Go from an A to a B and it's cool and all, but go from an A to a B to a E, and it sounds finished.

So, that's kind of an interesting thing to keep in mind when trying to get outside of the diatonic scale - half-step movements within the chords from one to the next can sound pretty powerful, and done carefully you can really "sell" some things that are absolutely NOT diatonic.

One good way to do this is simply to use a chromatic line, and build chords off that. Tons of classic examples in rock, I'd point to Stairway to Heaven and STP's Plush as good ones.

You can stop well short of that though and just use either a chord change that prominently features a half step move between the two chords, or a short chromatic line, to kind of sell the movement outside of the diatonic harmony. I don't remember the full changes off the top of my head and I'm writing this without a guitar, but Steven Wilson's "The Raven That Refused to Sing" does that quite nicely, with a piano figure in C minor that resolves to C minor the first time, but the next time to C major. Also, I'm trying to think of some of the stuff I've been working on lately and off the top of my head none of them are really great examples, but there was one song that I ended in a way pretty similar to this, where the chorus was in E major, starting on an A (I think, and there were some suspensions and whatnot going on, but basically A - C#m - A/B - E/G#), and to end it on something more interesting, the last time around I went from A to the C#m, up a half step to D major (which creates a feeling of tension), from D major to D minor, resolving down a half step on the major third to the minor third, F# to F, which creates even MORE tension... and from there, continuing down chromatically to the E, making that the 5th of an A, where I had the half step resolution from F to E, the half step resolution from D to C#, the major third of the A, and then an A held steady between the two... and suddenly all that tension you just built up is released and it sounds final.

But, tension and resolution. It's a different mindset, but thinking about how one chord resolves to the other can really open your thinking to moving from chord to chord in ways that build an then resolve tension, that have little to do with a single diatonic scale.

The problem of course is that you then have to figure out how to solo over this stuff.

If you want to be super technical, a lot of this thinking about cadence and resolution is something you see in the jazz world and is something that today we might look at as "jazz" harmony... but it's also something that was a big part of pop harmony until quite recently, and pop (and rock) have gotten gradually simpler and more diatonic in recent years, but there's absolutely no shortage of pop and rock music that doesn't fit neatly into a single scale and is functioning on terms like this. It's no more "jazz" harmony than harmonizing scales into triads and writing songs using triads based on the diatonic scale is.